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  Len Hodgeman

You have an idea ... to write something down ...

9/21/2014

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     So, you may not be the next Steve Jobs or Markus Persson, J.J Rowling or Rich Riordan, and may never be as good as you think you ought to be ... or maybe you wil! I hope so. But one thing is for sure, if you don't BEGIN to create, to invent, to build - in this case to write - you will never ever be a writer.
    The journey from the beginning to any particular end (or to a particular midpoint resting-on-your-laurels moment) can be a long and frustrating one, with many pleasant, and sometimes unpleasant twists and turns along the way.
     And there are no guarantees about this, baby. You may be a really bad, writer, a successful billionaire writer or anywhere in between. But if you really, REALLY want to be a writer, I can show you how. And if you want to a a better writer, I can guide you as you learn the craft. 
     I can hold your hand, I can help you get the ideas down, show you the tips, tricks and time-tested techniques for moving step-by-step from the initial fear of committing, through actually getting something down on paper (or on the computer), and progressing through the editing, proofreading and publishing processes.
     After 35 years of technical writing, I have written, edited and published hundreds of millions of words for the likes of the New York State government, the United States Post Office, Bank of America, Northrup-Grumman, IBM, HP, Dell and many Silicon Valley firms and startups. As well as helped several writers in publishing their fiction, poetry and business books.
     It has usually begun with an idea and a blank sheet of paper (in the early days), now a blank computer screen page. But you just have to start getting words down. Done it tens of thousands of times. You can do it too!
     One exciting technical tool I just started working with in the last few days is an iPhone app call Rev. This is great for those who need to create a b ook, but just don't like writing. Not a problem! 

Rev is just a pretty basic decent quality audio recorder, with one important difference. Once you sign up at their website and give them your credit card info, you just record and push a button to upload the file to their site. Forty-eight hours (or less) later you have a human-made transcription of your recording in your email inbox, ready for polishing and editing for a cost of $1/minute.
     So, a 15-minute test ramble cost me $15 (actually $5 with the first-time $10 discount). Came out to about 500 words. So a rough calculation - 
     A minimally impressive standard 'single topic" business trade paperback (9"x6") will consist of about 100 pages minimum, at approx 250 words per page, or 25,000 words. Depending on how well organized your thinking is and how fast you speak, you could record between 50-200 words per minute. Talking at 100 words per minute, that would equate to 250 minutes (a little over 4 hours) or $250 dollars for the initial content need to start putting the book together.  What a deal? With a 48-hour turnaround! Some people take years to just get that rough content down.
     Of course, if you're not a talker, I have many other approaches to stimulate the writing process, such as outlining, brainstorming, interviewing, Q&A, goals, steps, micromanagement, and more.
     Ultimately there is only now ... and a continuing series of now-moments-gone, which we call the past, and now-moments still to come, which we call the future. Still, anything that gets done, must be done now! Or at least started. :) - LEN
     



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New beginnings

4/12/2014

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I remember writing a poem sometime - God knows what happened to it - could be in my first book? About being tired of new beginnings. Yeah, and endings too, since they seem so closely related.

My family moved a lot when I was a child. Certainly that gave me a lot of resilience, ability to cope with and accept change as inevitable. Yet on the down side, loss of neighborhood and friends, frustration at having to start everything all over again, and again and again.

I don't think we lived in one place for more than 3 or 4 years at the most until I moved out at 16 or 17. And still kept moving - somehow by then it was a lifestyle. Though not consciously, each choice that I made from then on out appeared to include moving. Job, relationship, adventure, commitment - all eventually included moving - across town or across the country, even out of the country once.

I have now lived in San Mateo for about 11 years. The longest I have been in one physical location in my life. Still I have ended up moving several times within the city, even to different apartments in the same building, during this time.

My most recent move was about a year and a half ago, when I bought my condo in Woodlake. It was a good choice for many reasons. Yet I am now consciously at the point of figuring out whether to invest time and money (and heart) in making this condo more comfortable, how I might actually afford something better (i.e. bigger), or if I should move to somewhere with lower housing and living costs.

And begin again. For better or worse though, now I take more of msyelf with me when I go. And some things now don't have to end, but just change. 
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Joseph Anton: A Memoir

1/22/2014

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     It's a rather long book. I'm on page 373 of 633 pages - ebook pages, but still. For those who might not be too familiar with this book, it's the story of Salman Rushdie's life under the alias of Joseph Anton and under the protection of the British government during and for several years after, the publication of "The Satanic Verses."
     What an incredible journey that was, and even more so that he survived it, continued to write, and to speak out for freedom, the freedom to think, to write and to read what we like, despite the tyranny of those who would control our thoughts and our speech and what we are permitted to read or publish.
     The book is full of the writer's thoughts, doubts, fears and insights into religion, society, politics and the art and business of writing.
     I'd write more, but I have to get back to the book! I think anyone who considers themself a writer, or who wants to be a writer, should read this book.

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Little things - like laundry

12/24/2013

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     If I hadn't been doing my laundry on Christmas Eve, this never would have happened. I went to the laundry room on the floor above me to take my clothes out of the washer and put them in the dryer, and  someone had moved my clothes into the dryer - and put money in it.
     I know sometimes a person will take your laundry out of the washer and put in somewhere, perhaps even in the dryer, because they want to use the washer and they don't want to wait for you.
     But I know of no reason why they would have done this, except as a small gift in the true spirit of Christmas. I fantasize as to how it may have happened. Was it someone who lives next door to the laundry room and heard the washer. Then thought "Why, I'll just go move their laundry when it's done and pun the coins in for them." Or, I wonder if they somehow saw me and knew it was me, or did they just do it, not needing to know who it was for?
     I believe that the best gifts are those that are totally unexpected. Not necessarily something that we want, or even need, or would ever imagine getting. Just something that makes us feel warm all over, and makes us want to give something back - perhaps even to an unknown stranger - just because. Not because it makes us feel good to give, or because we think it will make the other person happy. But just because giving is - in and of itself - a wonderful, mysterious, magical thing.
     Perhaps tomorrow I - and you - may feel the urge to give just some little thing, without regard for person, place or timing, just because the opportunity is there.
     Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
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OK - Geek Alert! & Happy Holidays

12/21/2013

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     My Christmas present, from me to my favorite child - Me! So, it's been building for a while. The experiment in switching to Mac has come to a sad end. Well, not totally sad. 
     This is my new Acer Aspire S7. About the same weight as the MacBook Air that I will be retiring, but 13" instead of 11." I  didn't go all out like I did on the Air, after realizing that I really don't need desktop power on my laptop. I settled for a 3rd generation i5 processor with 4GM RAM and a 128 Raid 0 Solid State Drive. Been using it all morning. Plenty fast enough. Near instant resume and very fast boot from cold start.
     Despite running Windows on the Air, it was never as clean as running it native. Especially awkward was the often embarrassingly slow resume from sleep mode.
     So, I did a lot of internet research and hands-on at Fry's and Best Buy before ordering it on Amazon. 
     That's all for now. Happy Holidays to all my faithful readers. :)
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It's a Disaster!

12/16/2013

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LOVED THIS MOVIE - Had to pause 1/2 way through to catch a breath and cuz I was just so delightfully full I couldn't take any more. Weird, somewhat dark but lighthearted relationship movie - genius along the lines of - I don't know - like a mashup of Little Shop of Horrors, Rocky Horror Picture Show, My Dinner with Andre, something by Vonnegut, Spaceballs with a bit of Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice thrown in ... Great mostly classical music score, hilarious though understated writing, deep social and psychological commentary, awesome and totally unexpected plot twists/reversals . Aaaaah, how refreshing! The image above doesn't really do it justice, but then how could it? LMFAO
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A wee bit of awesomeness

12/10/2013

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     Just a short post to mark an extremely pleasurable event. My granddaughter, age 9 3/4, just wrote her first piece of fiction. I'd post the entire thing here, but she's a bit shy about it. It is such a great joy to know that at least part of that creativity and love of learning and expressing herself is a result of my influence.
     She asked me to type it up and I couldn't help but discuss the story a bit with her, and was delighted at how she took my questions and comments and revised the story somewhat, showing great skill in incorporating feedback into her own creative process.
     This is the joy of being a teacher, and I sometimes wonder what it might have been like to follow a different path where I was teaching young people every day.
     But at this point, it is a privilege whenever I get a chance to share something with a person of any age who has a passion to learn and to act on new knowledge.
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Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries

12/5/2013

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     Just watched the second episode of this show first broadcast on ABC1 (Australian Broadcasting Network) in February of 2012. I love Australian TV! 
     I don't want to give too much away, cause you can watch it on Netflix. It's an adaption of Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher Murder Mystery novels, with the protagonist an upper-class never-married woman, kind of an Upstairs-Downstairs meets feminist James Bond-type. (Her name is pronounced as in Fry-knee.) It's a bit edgy and socially conscious in that particular Australian style. 
     Well-written, well-acted and a good bit of humor. Here are a few reviews - 

'Fisher is a sexy, sassy and singularly modish character. Her 1920s Melbourne is racy, liberal and a city where crime occurs on its shadowy, largely unlit streets.' -- Canberra Times


'If you have not yet discovered this Melbourne author and her wonderful books featuring Phryne Fisher, I urge you to do so now... In a word: delightful' -- Herald Sun



'Greenwood's strength lies in her ability to create characters that are wholly satisfying: the bad guys are bad, and the good guys are great.' -- Vogue



And the second season just started in September (yeah!) - in Australia (darn!)


Now on to episode 3!







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When the Quiet comes

11/29/2013

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When the Quiet comes
slipping in on silent
satin-slippered feet

When the Quiet comes
sipping mint julip through
her perfect snow-white teeth

When the Quiet comes
all labor ends, our friends
stand aside as if to hide

Hoping somehow to cheat her
they cajole, implore, entreat her
but none will e'er defeat her.

She calmly pulls me to her breast
as swooning I am forced to rest
so drunken, so divinely blessed

No longer stressed, no more obsessed
at her behest, I close my eyes
release a sigh, a stifled cry and rise

To meet her lips
my arms around her hips
while our two souls merge

A distant solemn dirge
floats softly on the evening breeze
and the Quiet gently comes.
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Return to Java Beach

11/23/2013

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Can't remember how long it's been since I sat here at java Beach. Not a place I'd drive to from San Mateo, except on those occasions when I drive Trish back to the city for catechism and have to wait 2 hours to pick her up.
     But I think we're back on schedule for doing this more or less weekly - except for maybe some interruptions due to the holidays. Anyway, it's just one of those places/times which makes me feel like writing - you know - like a writer hanging in the cafe, writing.
     So, here I am. Just a few hundred feet from the Pacific, with sunshine streaming in the windows and clean fresh air coming in off the ocean. It was a tossup between coming here or just parking next to the ocean, but I did feel like writing and it seemed like this was the right way to go.
     This is a great place to write - especially with my hearing aids off. I get the feeling of the crowd without the noise. Just a kind of dull background roar as a soundtrack to the writing and occasional people watching.
     The crowd is now, and generally, a pleasant intergenerational mix. The only categories missing might be middle school through mid-teens. SIngle (or at least solo) moms and dads with a toddler, young professionals in their twenties, more beachy-looking middle agers and a sprinkling of senior citizens. 
     I noticed a small change today. The wifi now states that it is limited to two hours. Understandable and no constraint for me, since I only have about 1/1/2 hours between dropping Trish off and picking her up again.
     Next time I'll probably go to the ocean, but glad to be here again, and be blogging. Gotta go now, have a poem trying to get through. :)

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    Len Hodgeman
    Writing & Publishing Coach

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